After months of playing the victim, Bucyrus Council President Fankhauser and his allies show their true colors — launching personal attacks and silencing critics while city leadership enables him. FreeWire exposes the hypocrisy and chaos behind City Hall’s comment shutdown.
By Logan Andrew
Tuesday night’s Bucyrus City Council meeting ended not with a vote, but with a meltdown.
Council President Fankhauser — who has spent months portraying himself as a victim of online harassment — proved to everyone exactly who the real bully is.
Fankhauser vs. Keith French: The Hypocrisy Olympics
Keith French, a Crawford County resident who has attended meetings and submitted public records requests (like many engaged citizens), dared to challenge Fankhauser on the legality and ethics of merging public record audio with confidential emails.
French pointed out that the emails between Fankhauser and Capt. Walker seemed to show questionable handling of confidential material:
"I have the email chain between you and Capt. Walker. … Capt Walker sent you the file in a zip file first, then merged your audio into it in another email as an .avi file. He also would not release to you your request if anyone else had asked for the video."
Fankhauser’s response was a tirade that has since been deleted — but screenshots live forever:
"Keith French, you are the biggest worthless piece of excrement that ever walked into Bucyrus City Hall. Who the hell has time to drive to another city that they don’t even live in and waste everyone’s time making public record requests… Go back to Galion and stay there and I suggest you take the fork out of your mouth because you need to drop some pounds there buddy."
The irony? Fankhauser’s attack on French for being from Galion came while his own Galion-based friend was, at that exact moment, fighting in the comment section on his behalf.
Screenshot of Fankhauser's since deleted comment to Crawford County resident Keith French
The suspicious timing
On Thursday, just one hour before the committee meetings, the city posted a statement from Mayor Bruce Truka:
Subject: City Council Meeting Livestreams
I want to take a moment to address the status of our City Council meeting livestreams and our efforts to improve public access to these important discussions.
After the retirement of Gary Hess, Bonnie Welsh took on the task of getting our Access Channel back on the air—a process that began in November 2022 and has taken over two and a half years to accomplish. Restoring this service was a long-term goal, and I personally campaigned to bring Access back for the citizens of Bucyrus.
One of my key objectives was to transition away from Facebook Live and move entirely to our Access Channel for broadcasting city meetings. However, after gathering public input and consulting with our law director, we have decided to relaunch our Facebook livestreams starting May 5, 2025. To maintain the integrity of our discussions, Facebook livestreams will be available without the option for public comments.
We will continue broadcasting all meetings on our Access Channel and, as always, will upload the recordings to YouTube the following day for those who wish to watch at their convenience.
Thank you for your continued engagement in our city’s government.
What happened next? Not to be outdone in the drama department, Carolyn Shireman — former council member and well-documented problem child in local politics — commented something so vile on the city’s post that you know it crossed a line: the same city that can’t be bothered to moderate comments and instead took away an entire engagement format actually did something about it.
Speaking of Shireman, FreeWire obtained records that shows an exchange of over 240 emails between former Council member Shireman and their Galion ally. She instructed him to print out records — presumably for use in personal smear campaigns they disguise as “truth exposés.”
The public’s response: Humiliation and exhaustion
Bucyrus residents didn’t hold back:
"Seems like Elmo and Fankhauser have went off the rails. What an embarrassment for a city council president."
"Mr. Galion resident, you don’t even know our mayor’s name. Why are you here?"
"The comments aren’t hurting anything but maybe someone’s feelings from time to time."
The city pulls the plug — for the wrong reasons
Multiple attempts by a number of citizens to contact the mayor and city officials for clarification have gone unanswered.
Making matters worse, Spectrum revealed that only 8% of Crawford County residents even have access to the local government access channel. The majority of residents relied on Facebook livestreams and public comment sections to engage with their local government. Cutting off those comments effectively silences critics while leaving Fankhauser and his supporters unchecked elsewhere.
Many are calling this exactly what it looks like: city leadership bowing to Fankhauser to silence dissent. We’ve obtained footage of Fankhauser's worst enemy, himself, saying he would “never disable comments” — a promise broken the moment criticism turned toward him and his allies.
A pattern of victimhood, followed by bullying
The pattern is clear: Fankhauser and his circle play the victim every time they face criticism. But once the city gave them exactly what they wanted — silencing the public — they showed their true colors.
It got worse on Thursday night.
FreeWire stepped in as the only media willing to livestream the committee meetings, the only stream with viewers, that is. Despite all the talk of “toxic comments,” not one disparaging remark appeared. The “both sides” argument fell apart — until Fankhauser himself showed up in the comments. This time, he attacked Evan Pojman, the husband of Fankhauser's ex girlfriend, telling him he “should’ve pulled out.” That kind of crude, personal comment goes beyond political disagreement, not to mention adds credence to a noticeable "soft spot" of Fankhauser's, his former romantic interests.
When FreeWire hid one of Fankhauser's comments, he accused us of violating his free speech, bringing up why he thinks FreeWire started and throwing around accusations about someone threatening a veteran. First of all, why we started is none of his business. Secondly, we are not the government and are not bound by the First Amendment in that context. And third, none of this would even be a problem if he and his friends hadn’t thrown tantrums over a fake profile of an old woman jokingly telling Greg White to meet her in the parking lot — the so-called 'threat' they whined about.
He also suggested that comments were disabled to hide something before the primary election. It's always someone else’s fault. Fankhauser doesn’t want accountability — he just wants to burn everything down and complain about the ashes.
The bottom line: This isn’t leadership — it’s cowardice
The only thing more laughable than the behavior of Fankhauser and his minions is the administration’s willingness to give them exactly what they wanted. The administration’s decision to kill public comments, rather than hold disruptive individuals accountable, is being widely viewed as nothing short of cowardice. Government should represent everyone, not 8% of us, not 4 pathetic crybabies, wolves in sheep's clothing. Everyone.
The city didn’t silence chaos. They silenced citizens.
And in doing so, they handed power to the very people making a mockery of council meetings and public discourse.
👉 If you support real, independent local reporting, consider becoming a Founding Member of FreeWire.
Excellent article on the true facts behind Fankhauser, Shireman and Elmo’s actual motives. Keep up the good work.